It is my husband’s 37st birthday today. And even though he doesn’t know of this little space for me [waving to Softie ;)], I still feel like I should mention it here.

I am sooo happy to have him. You know, he’s not only my husband. Or father of my child. Or partner I can count on. He’s also my best friend. Just like that. I can tell him everything. Seriously, everything.

Things that make me happy will make him smiling. Things that make me sad will have him comfort me. If I am embarrassed by something I did or didn’t do, he will tease me with it until I get slightly mad and than it’s alright. Of course we do fight. Of course we disagree. But we always find a way to communicate. Communicate our feelings, opinions and wishes. Through talking, we solve everything.

There was a time when he was unemployed for a long period and I was still studying. That time sucked big time. All he did all day long was playing WoW. All I did was worrying. We talked it out. Half a year later he found his current employment, which is fantastic. I finished my studies. We got married. We moved here. And now, two and half years later, we celebrate his first birthday as a father.

As we talked about our feelings this morning in bed, we agreed we’d never been happier. It just feels so right, the three of us. We are family, you know. More to have we both never wished for.

See, all my yesterday’s bubbling came mainly from one thing. Two of the mom bloggers I love reading also gave birth this year. And one of them announced yesterday, that she’s pregnant again! Her baby boy’s just 5 months old. And it gets better: It’s probably twins.

As I understand it, this wasn’t what you’d call an “accident”. They aimed for getting pregnant again as fast as possible. I envy her. And at the same time, I am shaking my head, seeing worst case scenarios for that woman ahead in 9 months time.

I could never be that brave. And it IS braveness to willingly go for two so little children at a time (and maybe even three, omg!). In my eyes at least. Her son isn’t crawling yet, he’s sleeping a lot and maybe he will just stay that way (well, he will move at some point no doubt). But maybe he won’t.

But is there even something like that “right time”?

I guess I could handle having two small babies too. I am actually sure I could. But I would dearly miss my spare time which is small enough already. Is my ego to big? I don’t think so.

As I told you yesterday, I sometimes get that longing for a second child already. But I can stop myself. Easily. Our original plan sees us trying to conceive again around next year’s summer. So babyN would be two years at least when baby no.2 arrives.

But I COULD imagine to stop using contraceptives around his first birthday. Not actively trying from that point on, you know, but not trying to prevent either. Yeah. We’ll see…

That other mom blogger I love reading? She gave birth to her daughter 4 months ago. Last week she announced that they are trying to conceive again. I was wowed by that. Now she’s posting menstrual cycle charts and I envy her. And I long for those lovely pink charts. Seriously, what is it with me?

How did you “plan” your children? Did you just go for the second when you felt like it? Was it all shaped out, years planned ahead before you even had one? Or weren’t you planning at all? I am so confused! I always felt like 2 to 3 years apart are perfect. But what if babyno.2 doens’t happen that easily? It took us 6 month to conceive babyN. Shouldn’t I calculate such a period in as well?

Or should we clearly wait till babyN’s in kindergarten. So I have as much time for babyNo.2 as I do for babyN? Wouldn’t that be, I don’t know fair? Man, it is dawning to me, life with a second child will be so different again, no matter when.

My brother and I are 5 years apart and that’s definitely something I am not aiming for. My husband and his brother are twins, so this isn’t something to follow along either…

The cherry on the cake of this all: As I am still breast-feeding 100%, I don’t menstruate yet again. Duh! 😉

Sometimes, my boy just drives me crazy. He can be sooo exhausting. And he’s only 9 months old. On some days, I just wish I could lay down and sleep a little bit in between. I would. If only I could. Here’s the thing: He isn’t sleeping. Hardly. At. All. During the day.

He is that crazy bundle of energy. A l l the time in motion, all the time in action, never resting, always moving. And I have to follow him around, as the apartment isn’t save, as he tries to stand up and walk already, but barely can stand. I get so exhausted! During the last days, I hardly could sit down in between. I’m serious, he’s like that. And let me tell you something: I can take a lot. But if I can’t even have 10 minutes to drink a cup of coffee, one break during the morning, one in the afternoon, I get that tingly feeling inside my body and I get in a very bad mood.

I haven’t been sleeping more than 4 hours in a row for the last 9 months, and boy, I can really say that it is about time that I get a good night’s rest.

Don’t get me wrong, I love my boy like crazy. But I also love me. I don’t expect much and ohmygod who am I to lament, when I have a wonderful husband who comes home in the evening and first thing takes that Fidgety Philip off me. There are so many single moms and dads out there, and women and men who can’t count on their partners at all. I can. I am lucky and happy. I have a wonderful family. I don’t just say that, I mean it. With all my heart. I’d never change a thing.

But come on, baby, you really could use some sleep during the day! I can tell, because you get really really grumpy in the afternoon if you haven’t slept. As do I. We are a terrible match in that. We both seem to have our best time of the day in the early morning and get really sore towards afternoon.

Wow, I actually just realized consciously how much we are the same in our biorhythm. But let me tell you something, my love, I am not half as energetic as you are. Nope. Never have been, never will be. Ask your grandmother: I was a very calm baby, interested in all things as you are. Clever, smart, observant. But I did it the calm way, exploring and playing and such.

I am thinking about a second child a lot lately. It is clear to us, that you will get a brother or sister at some point. But I am getting that longing already. Now. Let’s just start trying for the second. But then, there you are. Driving me nuts. And not even through screaming or being nasty or anything bad at all. Just by being you, an active, healthy, very curious baby. One that actually right from the beginning on needed way less sleep than most babies do. A fantastic baby. I am so proud of you.I love you so much.

I will be as proud of your brother or sister, the day we will be a family of four – I will love all of you, all of us so much. Somewhere in the future. I have to thank you for wearing me out so much. Otherwise my heart would decide over my brains. It’d be too early now. Way too early. I can wait for another half a year. Ish. 😉

– get tons of laundry done (have an eye on the once again crowded laundry room downstairs – I seriously hate my freaky neighbors who put up their undergarments on the line. They take up all the space! who does this, anyways, or is it just me who just wouldn’t hang my underwear in a common room?)

– plan party for saturday

– write multiple shopping lists

– carve pumpkins and think about further deco material

– tidy up guest room which normally is our gamers corner and looks just like that 😉

Okay. I am all into pictures right now. It feels like a creative flow or something, only it doesn’t flow because I lack the skill for my fancy tools. *sigh*

My head’s full of images I want to take, everywhere I look a promising shot opens up before my eye – but I don’t really know how to use my camera to reproduce what I am seeing.

The same with the editing. I recently got my hands on an (older) Photoshop Elements version. Up until now I have been using Gimp, rarely with my photos but more in creating so called Fan Art: banners, avatars, wallpapers, stuff like that. The thing is: Gimp is crashing all the time (at least it does for me under Windows). Which is totally annoying, especially if you forget to click the ‘save-button’ every few seconds.

And most of the lovely stuff you can get for free around the internets (as textures, actions and the like) and most of the great tutorials are for Photoshop. I managed to adapt some of it to Gimp in the past, but it is a painful extra step especially if you are a noob with editing as I am.

So, tonight, I started using Photoshop Elements. And I managed to put a texture on a picture. Is this what you say? On? On top of? Behind? Anyways, I didn’t like the result a bit, but I got acquainted to some basic clicks in Photoshop – which is great! Believe me, I was frantically searching for the layers tab for at least 20 minutes… Did I mention that I can be pretty noobish with things like that? Yeah…

Oh this is all so exciting! *shriek*

P.S. In no way do I intention to down-talk Gimp! It is a great – and free – software. Probably even better than Photoshop. If you know what you are doing. If you don’t, Photoshop is way more intuitive and easier to handle, and, as I mentioned above, there are hundreds of great tutorials out there covering all you can dream of.

I’m still keeping Gimp. I kind of love it. It was my first serious editing software and opened up a whole new world to me.

And now I’m out to watch the latest episode of FlashForward. Good night, y’all! 🙂